Faculty, students and parents anxiously awaited the results of environmental testing at Malibu High School after several teachers came down with various serious illnesses in recent weeks, including cancer. (Photo by Christina Villacorte/Los Angeles Daily News)

Faculty, students and parents anxiously awaited the results of environmental testing at Malibu High School after several teachers came down with various serious illnesses in recent weeks, including cancer. (Christina Villacorte/Los Angeles Daily News)

Faculty, students and parents anxiously awaited the results of environmental testing at Malibu High School after several teachers came down with various serious illnesses in recent weeks, including cancer.

Principal Jerry Block expressed confidence the campus perched on a bluff above picturesque Zuma Beach does not pose a health risk. “I feel as safe here as I would in my own home,” he said. “I want parents to know their kids are safe when they leave them with us.”

Julie Wallach, however, picked up her daughter early from school because the 13-year-old complained of a headache after sitting in the choir room, one of the areas checked for potential hazards.

Wallach found it “very unsettling” that the school did not inform parents about the environmental testing until two weeks after it had begun. She learned about it from the media.

“To let know us that tests are under way would have been the responsible thing to do, so that we can make a choice as parents to either have our children here or not,” Wallach said.

Her daughter, Ashley, said her headache may have been caused by “mold in the air-conditioning vents,” though she had spent a lot of time in the choir room before without feeling any symptoms.

Sandra Gold, another parent, was debating having her own daughter get a checkup even though she graduated from the school three years ago. “We might, just to make sure,” she said.

Cameron Silbar, a 17-year-old senior, did not feel the need to see a doctor himself. “I’m not super worried about it,” he said, prompting classmate Sarah Toussing, 17, to chide him.

“You should be worried,” she told her friend. “I think it’s bad that multiple teachers have gotten the same thing. They’ve gotten surgery, and they’re OK now, but it’s still kind of sketchy.”

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A letter from teacher Katy Lapajne, obtained by City News Service, expressed concern that “three teachers have been diagnosed and continue to be treated for stage one thyroid cancer within the last six months.”

The letter added three teachers have been treated for other thyroid-gland problems and that seven have been suffering from persistent migraines.

At a school board meeting on Thursday, Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District construction manager Jan Maez said Executive Environmental of Arcadia has been contracted to obtain samples from the school.

“If we find any issues, they will be addressed immediately,” she said in comments reported by the Malibu Times.

Superintendent Sandra Lyon issued a memo Friday, saying there was no reason for kids not to continue going to school.

“We have had some illnesses from teachers but we have no evidence that there’s anything wrong with the campus,” noted principal Block. “We’re doing the testing, just to make sure out of an abundance of caution. We don’t want there to be any doubt in anybody’s mind that this is a safe place.”